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I've been told that ikkajo is simply an older way of saying ikkyo. It's use is probably indicative of an instructor who comes from a lineage that goes back to pre-war aikido. Or Daito ryu. You should understand that in Daito ryu, Ikkajo is a collection of waza, not just a single technique. And many of the pre-war students of Ueshiba Sensei recieved catalogues of waza as their "certificates" from Ueshiba...and these catalogues were of Daito ryu waza, and were written in a format that matched Daito ryu licenses (like the Hiden Mokuroku).

Some of our posters that are into linguistics can probably give a more complete answer from that perspective.

Best,
Ron

Ron Tisdale
-----------------------
"The higher a monkey climbs, the more you see of his behind."
St. Bonaventure (ca. 1221-1274)

I studied daito under three different teachers, None for more than two years at a stay. What I say in the following could be quite wrong. It comes from the accumilative memory of these experiences.

Ikajo, Nikajo, Sankajo, Yonkajo, Gokajo all refer to techniques originally designed to defeat grabs against one's jo staff.

Translated to empty hand combatives, one's forearm can relax (with form) and the bone of the forearm acts with the same leverage of the lifeless wood (the Jo). Of course, Ikkyo is performed in the same way and Ron's history of the terms stands firm.

The suffix: kajo is a counter. It means an article, an item, a provision, itemize. In Japanese, they have counters attached to the end of numbers to let you know what type of thing is being talked about: ippon {1 long thing}, isatsu {1 volume thing: book, mag} Dont' forget that in the old days they would mix up stuff on purpose to hide the true meaning of what was being talked about. Only the insiders were prevy to the lingo.

Uh, different JO I believe...as in different kanji. Peter or Josh or Jun could confirm.

What you see in the waza name is KAJO which, I believe, corresponds roughly to "catalogue"...

Best,
Ron (not a Japanese language scholar, and I certainly don't play one on tv )

I have the benefit of a 'captive' audience of Japanese (and Chinese) graduate students whom I can ask. I also consulted my Japanese monolingual dictionaries, especially the 13-volume Kokugo Dai-Kanwa Jiten.

The Japanese students were unanimous that kajou 箇条 was no longer used in everyday Japanese. Basically, it is a combination of 箇, which is a counter for inanimate objects, and 条, which has a variety of meanings within the general range of article (as in a legal contract), line, clause. So 条件 are conditions (jouken), as in 'I will agree, subject to the following conditions' (which are then specified).

The Chinese students all agreed that kajou had a different kanji in Chinese 個条: the Japanese combination of ka and jou was not used in modern Chinese.

There are three other combination using the Japanese kanji for ka. These are kagetsu (counted month), kanen (counted year), and kasho (counted place). However, I have only seen the last one in ordinary Japanese. Kasho means place, as in 'From Hiroshima to Miyoshi there are roadworks in three kasho' 箇所.

The two characters in question 箇 and 個 can be read as either KA or KO and both are counters of inanimate objects. So the second one is combined with the character for person to mean, individual 個人.

I hope that this casts enough darkness on the issue. However, I can see why Kisshomaru Ueshiba decided to change the prewar counters completely. 一教 (ikkyou) etc represented a major break with prewar tradition.

Maybe it makes more sense to consider it in light of the history behind its use in Aikido, not in some generic sense of the word in China or Japan..
Ueshiba was a Daito ryu teacher. When he opened his first Dojo he taught Shirata, Shioda, Inue, Mochizuki etc, out of the hiden mokuroku of Daito ryu, and even passed them out to his early students as levels of grading. In fact all said they were learning Daito ryu aikijujutsu up to the war. The mokuroku is a catalogue of 118 techniques divided into sections or kajo; ikkajo, nikkajo sankajo etc.
In Aikido's case ikkyo is a single technique with variations of doing "it." Ikkajo is 30 techniques with a myriad of variations of doing them. So, you were taught Ikkajo, nikkajo, sankajo, yonkajo, gokajo. No small stretch to see that Aikido has; ikkyyo, nikkyo, sankyo, yonkyo, gokyo. All single techniques based off of his Daito ryu teachings to his students when he simplified the art. This information is out there for anyone to read.
Cheers
Dan

Maybe it makes more sense to consider it in light of the history behind its use in Aikido, not in some generic sense of the word in China or Japan..
Ueshiba was a Daito ryu teacher. When he opened his first Dojo he taught Shirata, Shioda, Inue, Mochizuki etc, out of the hiden mokuroku of Daito ryu, and even passed them out to his early students as levels of grading. In fact all said they were learning Daito ryu aikijujutsu up to the war. The mokuroku is a catalogue of 118 techniques divided into sections or kajo; ikkajo, nikkajo sankajo etc.
In Aikido's case ikkyo is a single technique with variations of doing "it." Ikkajo is 30 techniques with a myriad of variations of doing them. So, you were taught Ikkajo, nikkajo, sankajo, yonkajo, gokajo. No small stretch to see that Aikido has; ikkyyo, nikkyo, sankyo, yonkyo, gokyo. All single techniques based off of his Daito ryu teachings to his students when he simplified the art. This information is out there for anyone to read.
Cheers
Dan

Hello all,

So, this makes me wonder if Aikido, as Ueshiba taught it, was a distillation or dilution of Takeda's Daito Ryu AJJ ?

It would be interesting to see when the change in name occured. Was it Ueshiba's pre-war Daito Ryu/Aikido or postwar Aikido when Ueshiba changed the name of the technique, possibly to distance himself and his art from DR AJJ ?

So, this makes me wonder if Aikido, as Ueshiba taught it, was a distillation or dilution of Takeda's Daito Ryu AJJ ?

It would be interesting to see when the change in name occured. Was it Ueshiba's pre-war Daito Ryu/Aikido or postwar Aikido when Ueshiba changed the name of the technique, possibly to distance himself and his art from DR AJJ ?

Take Care

-Blake

He didn't change the name, his students did as they tried to make sense of what the heck he was doing. Similar process in Daito Ryu around the same time.

The way Osensei taught the art was changed before the WWII. I can't quote you the exact year but he did change what he was doing. He added more circles, changed the mindset, and through out some stuff that he determined to be too dangerous. The name Aikido was not chosen by his students but by the Dai Nihon Butokukai.

I though that the kajo was a counter as described above, while the suffix -kyo meant "teaching." In my understanding, ~kyo has almost a religious connotation (bukyo=teachings of the buddha,for example) so the idea with ending the counters with ~kyo indicated that more was being taught than just techniques.

That said, I'm no scholar, and this is just what I put together when musing on the subject.

You should read Stan Pranin's interview with Noriaki Inoue in "Aikido Masters"... although Inoue doesn't give an indication of why/how it ended up being -kyo in Aikido, but it provides a context as to how it became -kajo in Sokaku Takeda's Daito-ryu.